Internal combustion engines may include an ignition system to ignite a mixture of fuel and oxidizer within a combustion chamber of the engine. Such ignition systems may include a pre-chamber, in which a small charge of fuel and oxidizer is ignited initially and then the partially burned products of this initial charge are forced from the pre-chamber into a main combustion chamber via nozzles or channels to ignite the main charge in the main combustion chamber.
An exemplary pre-chamber combustion system employing a pre-chamber to ignite a main combustion chamber of an engine is described in U.S. Pat. No. 8,857,405 (“the '405 patent”), issued Oct. 14, 2014. The pre-chamber combustion system described in the '405 patent includes a pre-chamber fuel admission valve and spark plug disposed within a pre-chamber that is fluidly connected to the combustion chamber. Ignition of the fuel-oxidizer mixture in the pre-chamber forces partially burned fuel into the combustion chamber and ignites a main fuel charge in the combustion chamber.
While the system of the '405 patent may be configured to provide a dispersed ignition of the main fuel charge in the combustion chamber, such systems may have drawbacks. For example, the pre-chamber fuel admission valve may be subject to relatively high temperatures and pressures present in the combustion chamber, and this harsh environment may limit the useful life of the pre-chamber fuel admission valve. For example, wear at the fuel admission valve of the pre-chamber injector may result in backflow from the pre-chamber through the fuel admission valve. If left unchecked, this backflow through the pre-chamber fuel admission valve can cause engine performance issues and other unwanted effects on the combustion process within the engine.
Accordingly, there is a need for improved pre-chamber combustion systems to address the problems described above and/or problems posed by other conventional approaches.
It will be appreciated that this background description has been created to aid the reader, and is not a concession that any of the indicated problems were themselves known previously in the art.